I´ve been living in NYC for over a
year and have always had the best of the intentions on giving CitiBike a try it
just hadn´t happened yet. Because of the usual concerns that any common non
biker would have about biking in a city like NYC. Its crazy traffic can scare
anyone.
Nevertheless
taking a class on sustainable transportation meant that I could no longer
postpone this. I needed to use the bike sharing program in order to understand
holistically the complex transportation system of NYC in order to be able to
judge it more assertively.
Without even looking
for it, there it was ... During my regular Sunday routine which consits in
going to a coffee shop a few blocks away from my apt. to study, I bumped into a
CitiBike stand where they were giving out free 2 week CitiBike trials.
They armed me with everything I
needed my key,a Bike map , a Guide to Cycling in NYC, a $10 discount cupon on a
helmet and an invitation to a CitiBike Street Skills Class which I went to . I
figured no harm in going. There they gave us a few tips about biking in the
City which were quite helpful refreshing my memory since it had been years
since I last biked. There I meet Emma a Danish girl who´s in New York doing
research for her thesis project which will be on the cycling culture in NYC she´ll
be reading this blog, hope its helpful.
Next step: a helmet , despite them
not being mandatory I think their use is very important. Which I got from a
biker friend who was kind enough to give me as much advice as he could before
setting me on the road.
After all this process I was finally ready to get on the bike amazingly it went way better than what I could have expected I loved it . Found it actually easier than what I imagined felt way safer and found that cars are aware of you and not against you I did most of my short commutes on the bike and found it more effcient than using the subway. As there is little connectivity from east to west and vice versa by subway I find CitiBike the perfect way of filling this gap.
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